which he was received. It is the place which we are set on earth to seek, dearly purchased, surely promised, to which God's Spirit is now preparing us, and of which it is our pledge and seal. Were it not for such an end and hope, how vain were man, and what a dream this world. Take heaven from us, and take our lives, our joys, yea, more than many such lives as these. Oh! that we could be more deeply sensible for what we are Christians, and for what we hope! what holy, patient, joyful Christians should we then be. But it is not a wavering belief, a divided heart, and a few cold, strange, and staggering thoughts of heaven that will do this as we desire it.

Observ. 6. Souls are not so closely tied to the body, but now they may be rapt up into paradise, or the third heavens.

When Paul could not tell whether it was in the body or out of it, it showeth somehow the soul was there, and that it is possible it might be out of the body.

Obj. If it were in the body, the body must go with it. If out of the body, it must leave the body dead.

Answ. It might be in the body, and not take up the body. If man were born blind, the lucid spirits, and a visive faculty would act only within, but as soon as a miracle opened his eyes, he would see as far as the sun and stars. And the sun sends down even its beams to this earth. Should God open this dark lantern of the body, we little know how far a soul may see without any separation from the body. Did not Stephen's soul in the body see Christ in glory?

And if it went out of the body, it followeth not that it must be separated from the body and leave it dead. When London was on fire, how high did the flame go above the fuel, and yet it was not separated from the fuel. A soul can stay in the body, and yet not be confined to it as a chicken in the shell, but may see, and mount above it to the heavens.

Use. Therefore think not of souls as you do of bodies, which are circumscribed in their proper places. We know not what formal thoughts to have of the dimensions or locality of spirits. Somewhat such eminenter they have, (for they have individuation and numeral quantity, and some passivity,) but not formaliter as gross bodies have. While the soul is in the body it worketh on it, and is a substance distinct from it, and such a form as hath also its own form, even its formal power or virtue, of vital activity, sensitive and intellective perception, and sensitive and rational appetite. It is active life itself, as the prin

ciple, it perceiveth itself, and loveth itself, it understandeth what other spirits are, by itself, it remembereth innumerable things past, it riseth up to some knowledge of God, it can seek, love, and obey him, and all this though not out of the body, yet above any efficiency of bodily organs. Oh! what a sad part of man's fall is it, to lose so much as the world hath done, of And to begin to know ourselves, our souls, and how man differs from a beast, is the first part of recovering knowledge, leading up towards the knowledge of God, which is the highest.

the knowledge of ourselves.

O then, sirs, do not only own the heavenly dignity of souls, but use your souls accordingly. Are they good for no better than to serve the body in lust and appetite, and keep it in motion and some pleasure, or at least from stinking a while in the world? Sinners, hear and consider, if you wilfully condemn your own souls to bestiality, God will condemn them to perpetual misery. Yea, you do it yourselves, and pass from brutishness to the devilish nature and woful state.

Observ. 7. The things of the heavenly paradise are to mortal men unutterable.

That is,

I. Such as cannot be uttered. And,

II. Such as must not be uttered. It is not lawful to Paul that saw them.

Not that nothing of it may or must be uttered. Christ hath brought life and immortality to light. They are great things and glorious which are by him revealed. Enough well believed and used to overcome the temptation of this flesh and world, and to raise us to a holy life, and joyful hope, and comfortable sufferings and death. Christ best knoweth the just measure of revelation meet for earth. Candles must serve for narrow and dark rooms, and are more worth than all the gold on earth. The sun by day must not come too near us lest it burn us up, but send us its beams at the distance that we can bear them. And all souls are not here meet for the same measures, much less for that sight which the glorified enjoy. The pure in heart do see God, (Matt. v.,) and even here more than impure souls.

I. There is no human language that hath words fit to reveal that part of the heavenly things which God hath shut up from us as his secrets. Man's words are only fitted to man's use and to man's concerns, and not to angels and the secrets of heaven. We speak not a word of God himself, which signifieth formally

what God is, but only analogically or by similitude, and yet not in vain. Paul saw, and holy souls see, that which no human language can properly express.

2. And if it could, yet mortals could not understand it, no more than a language which they never heard.

3. And Paul had it revealed in a manner suited to his own use, and not in a manner meet for communication.

II. And it was unlawful also to utter it. 1. For God saw not all that meet for the dark world of undisposed sinners, which was allowed to one eminent saint.

2. Nor would he have so much more revealed by a minister than the Son of God from heaven had himself before revealed.

3. And the revelation is to be suited to the fruition. Full knowledge is fit only for those that must fully enjoy it.

Use. Therefore remember with what measures of heavenly knowledge we must be here content, so much as Christ hath re vealed and is suitable to a distant life of faith. I have known some run into greater calamities than I will mention, by an expectation of visible communion with angels, and others by rash conceits of visions, dreams, and prophetical revelations ; but the common error of Christians is, to content themselves with a feeble faith, (or at least get no better,) and then think it should be made up by somewhat like to sight or corporal sense, and to be unsatisfied because they know no more than by believing they can reach to. As if believing were but an uncertain apprehen sion, (with which we are unsatisfied,) and we are not content to live on that which God hath revealed, but we would fain know more, before we are ready for it; whereas we must explicitly believe all that is explicitly revealed, and implicitly believe and trust God for the rest.

We are here used to live by sight and sense, and the soul is strange to such apprehensions as are quite above sense and without it. And fain we would have God bring down the unseen things to these sensations and perceptions, and we would fain have distinct and formal knowledge of that which God hath but generally revealed. It is somewhat excusable for a soul to desire this, as it is the state of perfection to which we do aspire. But it is not well that we remember not more that sight and full fruition are reserved together for the life to come, and that we live no more thankfully and joyfully on so much as we may in the body by believing know.

Quest. What may we conjecture those things are which Paul had seen, and must not utter?

Why should we inquire when they must not be uttered? We may mention a possibility to rebuke our bold, unquiet thoughts. Our souls would fain have not only analogical, but formal conceptions of the essence, substance, glory, immensity, eternity of God. Hope for much in heaven, but never for an adequate comprehension. But this is the very highest of all those things which are not to be uttered, and therefore not to be here attained.

Our souls would fain be perfect extensively and intensively in philosophy, and know heaven and earth, the spheres, or orbs, or vortices; the magnitudes, number, distances, motions, and the nature of all the stars, and the compagination of the whole frame of being. But this is unutterable, and not here to be known.

Our souls would fain know more of the angelical nature; what such spirits are, whether absolutely immaterial as mere acts and virtues; or substances which are pure matter, and what their number and differences are, and how vast, and many, and distant their habitations, and what are their offices on earth or elsewhere; and how much they know of us and our affairs, and in what subordination men, churches, and kingdoms stand to them, and they to one another, and how they are individuated, and how far one. But all these are unutterable, and locked up

from us.

Our souls would fain know whether there was any world before this earth, and the creation of the six days; and whether there was any spiritual Being, which was an eternal effect by emanation from an eternal cause, as light from the sun; and whether the sun and stars are intellectual or sensitive, and exceed man in form, as well as in matter, and what the noble nature of fire is. But these things are unutterable, and so not knowable to us. Our souls would fain have more sensible perceptions of themselves, as to their substance, and their separate state. Whether they are substances utterly immaterial; how they are generated, how they subsist, and act out of the body, and how they do enjoy. How they are individuate, and yet how far How far one or not one with Christ, and one another. Whether they are divisible in substance as continued quantities, as well in number as quantitates discrete. What place and limits do confine them (being not infinite). How far they have

one.

still sensation; and how they see, praise, and enjoy God d; and how they converse with one another; and how far they know the things on earth; and how their state before the resurrection differs from what it will be after; and how far the soul will be instrumental in the raising of the body. But all these are unutterable things.

We would fain know more of the decrees of God, and how all his acts are eternal, and yet produce their effects in time. How they are many, and yet but one, producing divers contrary effects. Many such things inquisitive nature would fain know which are unutterable.

But this must satisfy us :

1. That sinful souls, and dark, in a dark body, and a dark world, are not fit for so great a light, nor capable of it. It will put out our eyes to gaze so nearly on the sun.

2. That Christ hath revealed so much of the greatness and certainty of the heavenly glory, as he seeth meet and suitable to God's holy ends and us.

3. That the church hath so much clearer a revelation than the heathen and infidel world, as should make us thankful for our light.

4. That, if we believe the revelation of the gospel soundly, we may live a holy, joyful life, and die in the peace and triumph of our hopes.

5. That it is not by sight, but by faith that we must here live, in our wilderness expectant state.

6. That the more we cleave to God, and live by faith above the flesh and world whilst we are in it, the clearer and sweeter our apprehensions of heaven will be.

yet

7. That God must be trusted implicitly about that which is unknown to us, as well as explicitly for what we know. And, 8. That what we know not now, we shall know hereafter, and the day is near. Let these things quiet our souls in health and sickness, though we are yet in darkness as to the unutterable things.

9. And always add, that what we know not, Christ knoweth for us, to whom it belongeth to prepare the place for us, and us for it, and to receive us. Had we but a friend in heaven whom we could trust, we could partly take up with their knowledge. Our Head is there, and the eyes that we must trust to are in our Head. But how was Paul in danger of being exalted above measure, by the abundance of revelations ?