seience so far as innocent, makes an apology against unjust charges, and sustains a man under the most cruel sentence, being persuaded of a superior tribunal that will rectify the errors of man's judgment: but when guilty, terrifies the offender with the flashes of judgment to come, though he may escape present sufferings. Of this double power of conscience I shall add some lively examples.

Plato represents his admirable Socrates after an unjust condemnation to death, in the prison at Athens encompassed with a noble circle of philosophers discoursing of the soul's immortality, and that having finished his arguments for it, he drank the cup of poison with * an undisturbed courage, as one that did not lose but exchange this short and wretched life for a blessed and eternal. For thus he argued, that there are two ways of departing souls leading to two contrary states, of felicity and of misery, those who had defiled themselves with sensual vices, and given full scope to boundless lusts in their private conversion, or who by frauds and violence had been injurious to the commonwealth, are dragged to a place of torment, and for ever excluded from the joyful presence of the blessed society above. But those who had preserved themselves upright and chaste, and at the greatest distance possible from the contagion of the flesh, and had, during their union with human bodies, imitated the divine life, by an easy and open way returned to God from whom they came. And this was not the sense only of the more virtuous heathens, but even some of those who had done greatest force to the human nature, yet could not so darken their minds, and corrupt their wills, but there remained in them stinging apprehensions of punishment hereafter. Histories inform us of many tyrants that encompassed with the strongest guards have been affrighted with

* Et quum pœne manu sua mortiferam teneret poculum, loquutus est, ut non ad mortem trudi, verum in cœlum videretur ascendere. Ita enim censebat, itaque disseruit, duas esse vias, duplicesq; cursus animorum e corpore excedentium. Nam qui se humanis vitiis contaminassent, & se totos libidinibus dedissent, quibus cæcati, vel domesticis vitiis & flagitiis se inquinassent, vel in republica violanda fraudes inexpiabiles concæpissent, iis devium quoddam iter esset seclusum a concilio deorum. Qui autem se integros castosque servassent, quibusque fuisset minima cum corporibus contagio, seque ab his semper sevocassent, essentq; in corporibus humanis vitam imitati deorum, his ad illos a quibus essent profecti facilem reditum patere. Tull, de Socrat. lib. 1. Tusc. quæst.

the alarms of an accusing conscience, and seized on by inward terrors, the forerunners of hell, and in the midst of their luxurious stupifying pleasures have been haunted with an evil spirit, that all the music in the world could not charm. The persons

executed by their commands were always in their view, showing their wounds, reproaching their cruelty, and citing them before the high and everlasting judge, the righteous avenger of innocent blood. How fain would they have killed them once more, and deprived them of that life they had in their memories? that was beyond their power. Of this we have an eminent instance in * Tiberius, who in a letter to the senate opened the inward wounds of his breast, with such words of despair, as might have moved pity in those who were under the continual fear of his tyranny. No punishment is so cruel as when the offender and executioner are the same person. Now that such peace and joy are the effects of conscious integrity, that such disquiets and fears arise from guilt, that incomparably exceed all that is sweet or afflicting in the world, is a convincing argument that the divine providence is concerned in the moral actions of men whether virtuous or wicked done here. That the righteous God has rewards and punishments infinitely above all the good and evil things of the present state; and consequently that the comforts of holy souls are the firstfruits of eternal happiness, and the terrors of the wicked, are the gradual beginnings of sorrows that shall never end.

Before I finish this discourse it will be requisite to answer two objections that infidels are ready to make.

1. They argue against the reality of future recompences; that they are invisible, and we have no testimony from others who know the truth of them by experience. As Alexander's soldiers after his victories in the east, refused to venture over the ocean with him for the conquest of other kingdoms beyond it, alledging, facile ista finguntur quia oceanus navigari non potest. The seas were so vast and dangerous that no ship could pass through them. Whoever returned that was there? Who has given testimony from his own sight of such rich and pleasant countries? Nothing can be more easily feigned that it is, than that of which

* Tiberium non fortuna, non solitudines protegebant, quin tormenta pectoris suasque panas ipse fateretur. Tacit.

there can be no proof that it is not. And such is the language of infidelity of all that undertook that endless voyage to another world, whoever came back through the immense ocean of the air to bring us news of such a happy paradise as to make us despise this world? Do they drink the waters of forgetfulness, so as to lose the memory of the earth and its inhabitants? If there were a place of endless torments of the millions of souls that every day depart from hence, would none return to give advice to his dear friends to prevent their misery? Or when they have taken that last step, is the precipice so steep that they cannot, ascend hither? Or does the soul lose its wings that it cannot take so high a flight? These are idle fancies. And from hence they conclude, that none ever return, because they never come there, but finally perish in the dissolution of the body, and are lost in the abyss of nothing: when they cease to live with us, they are dead to themselves. And consequently they judge it a foolish bargain to part with what is present and certain for an uncertain futurity. Thus they make use of reason for this end, to persuade themselves that men are of the same nature with the beasts, without reason.

To this I answer:

(1.) Though the evidence of the future state be not equal to that of sense as to clearness, yet it is so convincing, even by natural light, that upon far less men form their judgments, and conduct their weightiest affairs in the world, To recapitulate briefly what has been amplified before; is there not a God the maker of the world? Is there no counsel of providence to govern it? No law of righteousness for the distinction of rewards? Are there not moral good and evil? Are reason, virtue, grace, names without truth, like chimæras of no real kind, the fancies of nature deceived and deceiving itself? Are they only wise among men, the only happy discoverers of that which is proper and best, and the all of man, who most degenerate to brutishness? Shall we judge of the truth of nature in any kind of beings, by the monsters in it? What generation of animals has any show of veneration of a deity, or a value for justice, either peace or remorse of conscience, or a natural desire of an intellectual happiness in life, and an eternal after death? Is there not even in the present state some experimental sense, some impressions in the hearts of men of the powers of the world to come?

These things are discernible to all unprejudiced minds. And can it be pretended that there is not a sufficient conviction that men and beasts do not equally perish?

(2.) There is a veil drawn over the eternal world for most wise reasons. If the glory of heaven were clear to sense, if the mouth of the bottomless-pit were open before men's eyes, there would be no place for faith, and obedience would not be the effect of choice but necessity, and consequently there would be no visible discrimination made between the holy and the wicked.' The violent inclinations to sin would be stopt as to the act, without an inward real change of the heart. If the blasphemer, or false swearer were presently struck dumb, if the drunkard should' never recover his understanding, if the unclean wretch should' immediately be consumed by a hidden fire, or his sinning flesh putrefy and rot away; if for every vice of the mind, some disease that resembles it in the body were speedily inflicted as a just punishment, the world indeed would not be so full of all kinds of wickedness, so contagious, and of such incurable malignity.' But though in appearance it would be less vicious, yet in truth and reality not more virtuous. For such a kind of goodness, or rather not guiltiness of the outward sinful act, would proceed not from a divine principle, a free spirit of love to God and holiness, but from a low affection, mere servile fear of vengeance. And love to sin is consistent with such an abstinence from it. As a merchant that in a tempest is forced to cast his goods into the sea, not because he hates them, for he throws his heart after, but to escape drowning. Now that the real difference between the godly and the impious, the just and unjust, the sober and intemperate may appear, God affords to men such evidence of future things that may satisfy an impartial considering person, and be a sure defence against temptations that infect and inchant the careless mind, and pervert the will, to make a foolish choice of things next the senses for happiness. Yet this evidence is not so clear, but a corrupt heart may by a secret, but effectual influence, darken the understanding, and make it averse from the belief of unseen things, and strongly turn it from serious pondering those terrible truths that control the carnal desires.

(3.) How preposterous is this inference? Departed souls never return, therefore they have no existence, therefore we are

but a breath of wind that only so long remains in being, as it blows; a shadow that is only whilst it appears; let our hours then that are but few, be filled with pleasures; let us enjoy the present, regardless of hereafter, that does not expect us. Philosophy worthy of brutes! But prudence will conclude if the condition of souls that go hence be immutable, and in that place where they arrive, they must be for ever, it should be our chiefest care to direct them well: if upon our entrance into the next world eternity shuts the door upon us, and the happiness and misery of it is not measured by time, but the one excludes all fear, the other all hope of change, it is necessary to govern all our actions with a final respect to that state. This is to discourse as a man according to the principles of right reason.

2. If it be objected that it seems hard that a transient sin should be punished with eternal torments: a clear and just answer may be given.

This conceit in men proceeds from a superficial deceitful view of sin in the disguises of a temptation as it flatters the senses, without a sincere distinct reflection on its essential malignity. From hence they judge of their sins, as light spots, inevitable accidents, lapses that cannot be prevented by human frailty, errors excusable by common practice. Thus the subtility of Satan joined with the folly of men represents great sins as small, and small as none at all, to undervalue and extenuate some, and to give full license and warrant to others. And thus deceived, they are ready to think it disagreeing to the divine goodness to punish sin so severely as it is threatened. But did they with intent and feeling thoughts look through the pleasing surface into the intrinsic evil of sin, as it is rebellion against God, and the progeny of a will corrupted by its own perverseness and pernicious habits, they would be convinced, that God acts in a manner worthy of his nature, in the ordaining and inflicting eternal punishment on impenitent sinners. And it is observable that most dangerous effects follow by separating these two in the minds of men. For if they consider eternal death without respect to the merit of sin, they easily conceive of God as incompassionate, an enemy to his creature, that is pleased with its misery. And such fearful conceits, such black melancholy vapours congeal the heart and stupify its active powers, and cause a desperate neglect of our duties, as if God would not accept our