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of God.

PART III. seed exceedingly; that is, speaketh in the person Neither was this apparition a fancy Angel, what. figured, but a voice. By which it is manifest, that angel signifieth there, nothing but God himself, that caused Agar supernaturally to apprehend a voice from heaven; or rather, nothing else but a voice supernatural, testifying God's special presence there. Why therefore may not the angels that appeared to Lot, and are called (Gen. xix. 12) men; and to whom, though they were two, Lot speaketh (verse 18) as but to one, and that one, as God, (for the words are, Lot said unto them, Oh not so my Lord), be understood of images of men, supernaturally formed in the fancy; as well as before by angel was understood a fancied voice? When the angel called to Abraham out of heaven, to stay his hand (Gen. xxii. 11) from slaying Isaac, there was no apparition, but a voice; which nevertheless was called properly enough a messenger or angel of God, because it declared God's will supernaturally, and saves the labour of supposing any permanent ghosts. The angels which Jacob saw on the ladder of Heaven, (Gen. xxviii. 12) were a vision of his sleep; therefore only fancy, and a dream; yet being supernatural, and signs of God's special presence, those apparitions are not improperly called angels. The same is to be understood, (Gen. xxxi. 11) where Jacob saith thus, The Angel of the Lord appeared to me in my sleep. For an apparition made to a man in his sleep, is that which all men call a dream, whether such dream be natural, or supernatural: and that which there Jacob calleth an angel, was God himself; for the same angel saith, verse 13, I am the God of Bethel.

Also (Exod. xiv. 19) the angel that went before

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the army of Israel to the Red Sea, and then came PART HI. behind it, is, (verse 24) the Lord himself; and he appeared, not in the form of a beautiful man, but Angel, what. in form, (Exod. xiii. 21) by day, of a pillar of cloud, and, by night, in form of a pillar of fire; and yet this pillar was all the apparition and angel promised to Moses, (Exod. xxxiii. 2) for the army's guide for this cloudy pillar (Exod. xxxiii. 9) is said to have descended, and stood at the door of the Tabernacle, and to have talked with Moses.

There you see motion and speech, which are commonly attributed to angels, attributed to a cloud, because the cloud served as a sign of God's presence; and was no less an angel, than if it had had the form of a man, or child of never so great beauty; or wings, as usually they are painted, for the false instruction of common people. For it is not the shape; but their use that makes them angels. But their use is to be significations of God's presence in supernatural operations; as when Moses (Exod. xxxiii. 14) had desired God to go along with the camp, as he had done always before the making of the golden calf, God did not answer, I will go, nor, I will send an angel in my stead ; but thus, My presence shall go with thee.

To mention all the places of the Old Testament where the name of angel is found, would be too long. Therefore to comprehend them all at once, I say, there is no text in that part of the Old Testament, which the Church of England holdeth for canonical, from which we can conclude, there is, or hath been created, any permanent thing, understood by the name of spirit or angel, that hath not quantity; and that may not be by the under

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PART III. standing divided; that is to say, considered by parts; so as one part may be in one place, and the Angel, what. next part in the next place to it; and, in sum, which is not (taking body for that, which is somewhat or some where,) corporeal; but in every place, the sense will bear the interpretation of angel, for messenger; as John Baptist is called an angel, and Christ the Angel of the Covenant; and as, according to the same analogy, the dove and the fiery tongues, in that they were signs of God's special presence, might also be called angels. Though we find in Daniel two names of angels, Gabriel and Michael; yet it is clear out of the text itself, (Dan. xii. 1) that by Michael is meant Christ, not as an angel, but as a prince: and that Gabriel, as the like apparitions made to other holy men in their sleep, was nothing but a supernatural phantasm, by which it seemed to Daniel, in his dream, that two saints being in talk, one of them said to the other, Gabriel, Let us make this man understand his vision: for God needeth not to distinguish his celestial servants by names, which are useful only to the short memories of mortals. Nor in the New Testament is there any place, out of which it can be proved, that angels, except when they are put for such men as God hath made the messengers and ministers of his word or works, are things permanent, and withal incorporeal. That they are permanent, may be gathered from the words of our Saviour himself, (Matt. xxv. 41) where he saith, it shall be said to the wicked in the last day, Go ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his angels: which place is manifest for the permanence of evil angels, (unless we might think the name of Devil

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and his angels may be understood of the Church's PART III. adversaries and their ministers); but then it is repugnant to their immateriality; because everlasting Angel, what. fire is no punishment to impatible substances, such as are all things incorporeal. Angels therefore are not thence proved to be incorporeal. In like manner where St. Paul says, (1 Cor. vi. 3) Know ye not that we shall judge the angels? and 2 Pet. ii. 4, For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down into hell: and (Jude i. 6) And the angels that kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the last day: though it prove the permanence of angelical nature, it confirmeth also their materiality. And (Matt. xxii. 30) In the resurrection men do neither marry nor give in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven : but in the resurrection men shall be permanent, and not incorporeal; so therefore also are the angels.

There be divers other places out of which may be drawn the like conclusion. To men that understand the signification of these words, substance, and incorporeal; as incorporeal is taken, not for subtle body, but for not body; they imply a contradiction: insomuch as to say, an angel or spirit is in that sense an incorporeal substance, is to say in effect, there is no angel nor spirit at all. Considering therefore the signification of the word angel in the Old Testament, and the nature of dreams and visions that happen to men by the ordinary way of nature; I was inclined to this opinion, that angels were nothing but supernatural apparitions

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PART III. of the fancy, raised by the special and extraordinary operation of God, thereby to make his presence and commandments known to mankind, and chiefly to his own people. But the many places of the New Testament, and our Saviour's own words, and in such texts, wherein is no suspicion of corruption of the Scripture, have extorted from my feeble reason, an acknowledgment and belief, that there be also angels substantial, and permanent. But to believe they be in no place, that is to say, no where, that is to say, nothing, as they, though indirectly, say, that will have them incorporeal, cannot by Scripture be evinced.

Inspiration, what.

On the signification of the word spirit, dependeth that of the word INSPIRATION; which must either be taken properly; and then it is nothing but the blowing into a man some thin and subtle air or wind, in such manner as a man filleth a bladder with his breath; or if spirits be not corporeal, but have their existence only in the fancy, it is nothing but the blowing in of a phantasm; which is improper to say, and impossible; for phantasms are not, but only seem to be, somewhat. That word therefore is used in the Scripture metaphorically only as (Gen. ii. 7) where it is said that God inspired into man the breath of life, no more is meant, than that God gave unto him vital motion. For we are not to think that God made first a living breath and then blew it into Adam after he was made, whether that breath were real, or seeming; but only as it is, (Acts xvii. 25) that he gave him life, and breath; that is, made him a living creature. And where it is said, (2 Tim. iii. 16) all Scripture is given by inspiration from God, speaking there