The Soul of Man, Part 8 · Doctrine · Proposition 9
PROP. IX. The Pleasures and Delights of the separate Spirits of the just, are incomparably greater and sweeter, than those they did, or at any time could experience in their bodily state.
WIth what a pleasant face would death smile upon Believers, what Roses would it raise in its pale cheeks, if this Proposition were but well setled in our hearts by faith! And if we will not be wanting to our selves, it may be firmly settled there, by these four Considerations, which demonstrate it.
Consideration I.
Whatsoever Pleasure any man receives in this World, he receives it by means of his Soul. Even all corporeal and sensitive delights have no other relish and sweetness, but what the Soul gives them; which is demonstrable by this, that if a man be placed amidst all the pleasing Objects and Circumstances in the World, if he were in that Centre where he might have the confluence of all the delights of this World; yet if the Spirit be wounded, there is no more relish or savour in them, than in the White of an Egg. What pleasure had Spira in his Liberty, Estate, Wife and Children? These things were indeed proposed and urged again and again to relieve him; but instead of pleasure, they became his horrour: let but the mind be wounded, and all the mirth is marr'd; one touch from God upon the Spirit, destroys all the joy of this World. Nay,
Let but the intention of the mind be strongly carried another way, and for that time, (though there be no guilt or wound upon the Soul) the most pleasant enjoyments lose their pleasure. What Delight, think you, would bags of Gold, sumptuous Feasts, or exquisite melody have afforded to Archimedes, when he was wholly intent upon his Mathematical lines? By this then it is evident, that the rise of all pleasure is in the mind, and the most agreeable and pleasing Objects and Enjoyments, signifie nothing without it: The mind must be found in it self, and at leisure to attend them, or we can have no pleasure from them.
Consideration II.
Of all Natural Pleasures in the World, Intellectual Pleasures are found to be most agreeable and connatural to the Soul of man.
The more refined and remote from sense any pleasure is, the more grateful it is to the Soul; those are certainly the sweetest Delights that spring out of the mind. A drop of intellectual pleasure is valued by a generous and well tempered soul, above the whole Ocean of impure Joys, which come to it sophisticated and tang'd through the muddy Channels of sense.
No sensualists in the World can extract such pleasure out of Gold, Silver, Meat, and Drink; as a searching and contemplating mind finds in the discovery of truth. *In qua simulac pedem posui, foribus pessulum obdo, & in ipso aeternitatis gremio inter tot illustres animas sedem mihi sumo; cum ingenti quidem animo: ut s…bindè magnaetum misereat, qui hanc faelicitatem ignorant. Epist. Prin.Heynsius, that learned Library-keeper of Leyden, professed, that when he had shut up himself among so many illustrious Souls, he seemed to sit down there as in the very lap of Eternity, and heartily pitied the Rich and Covetous Worldlings that were strangers to his Delights.
†Arcana coeli, naturae secreta, ordinem universi scire; majoris foelicitatis & dulcedinis est; quam c…gitatione quis assequi potest, aut mortalis sperare.And Cardan tells us, that to know the secrets of Nature, and the order of the Universe▪ hath greater pleasure and sweetness in it, than the thoughts of Man can fathom, or any Mortal hope for. Yea, such beauty, saith *Talis est Mathematum pulchritudo, ut his indignum sit divitiarum phal…ras istas & bullas & puerilia spectacula comparari.Plutarch, there is in the Study of the Mathematicks, that it were unworthy to compare such Baubles and Bubbles as Riches, with it. Yea, saith another †Dulce est extingui Mathematicarum artium studio. Leon. Diggs., it were a sweet thing to be extingnished in those Studies.
Iulius Scaliger was so delighted with Poetry, that he protested he had rather be the Author of twelve Verses in Lucan, than Emperour of Germany. And to say truth, there is a kind of *Talis suavitas ut cum quis ea degustaverit, quasi circeis poculis captus, non potest …nquam ab illis divelli. Cardan.enchanting sweetness in those intellectual Pleasures and Feasts of the mind; such a delight as hardly suffers the mind to be pull'd away from it. These Pleasures have a finer edge, an higher gust, a more agreeable savour to the mind than sensitive ones; as approaching much nearer to the nature of the Soul, which is spiritual.
Consideration. III.
And as Intellectual pleasures do as far exceed all sensitive pleasures, as those which are proper to a man, do those which we have in common with Beasts: So Divine pleasures do again much more surmount Intellectual ones. For what compare is there betwixt those joys which surprize a Scholar in the discovery of the Secrets of Nature, and those that overwhelm and swallow up the Christian in the discovery of the glorious Mysteries of Redemption by Christ, and his own personal interest therein!
To solve the Phaenomena of Nature is pleasant, but to solve all the difficulties about our Title to Christ and his Covenant, that is ravishing. Archimedes his foreign, I have found it, was but the frisk or skip of a Boy: that rapturous voice of the Spouse, My Beloved is mine, and I am his. These are Entertainments for Angels, 1 Pet. 1.12. a short Salvation for the season it is felt and tasted, 1 Pet. 1.8. after these delights all others are insipid and dry. And yet one step higher.
Consideration IV.
All that divine pleasure which ever the holiest and devoutest Soul enjoyed in the Body, is but a Sip, or Praelibation, …ompared with those full draughts it hath in the unbodied State.
Whilst it is embodied, it rejoyceth in the Earnests and Pledges of joy, but when it is unbodied, it receives the full summ, Psal. 16.11. In thy presence is the fulness of joy. This fulness of joy is not to be expected, because not to be supported in this World. The joy of Heaven would quickly make the hoops of Nature flie. When a good man had but a little more than ordinary of the joy of the Lord poured into his Soul, he was heard to cry, Hold, Lord, hold, thy poor Creature is but a clay Vessel, and can hold no more. These Pleasures the Soul hath in the Body, are of the same kind indeed with those in Heaven, but are exceeding short of them in divers other respects.
1. The Spiritual Pleasures the Soul hath in the Body, are but by reflection; but those it enjoys out of the Body, are by immediate intuition, 1 Cor. 13.12. now in a glass, then face to face.
2. The Pleasures it hath now, though they be of a Divine nature, yet they are relished by the vitiated Appetite of a sick, and distempered Soul; the embodied Soul is diseased and sickly, it hath many Distempers hanging about it. Now we know the most pleasant things lose much of their pleasure to a sick man; the separate Soul is made perfect, throughly cured of all Diseases, restored to its perfect health; and consequently Divine Pleasures must needs have an higher gust and relish in Heaven than ever they had on earth.
3. The Pleasures of a Gracious Soul on earth, are but rare and seldom, meeting with many and long interruptions; and many of them occasioned by the Body, which often calls down the Soul to attend its Necessities; and converse with things of a far different nature: But from these, and all other ungrateful and prejudicial Avocations, the separated Soul is discharged and set free. So that its whole Eternity is spent in the highest Delights.
4. The highest Pleasures of a Gracious Soul in the Body, are but the Pleasures of an uncentred Soul, which is still gravitating and striving forward, and consequently can be but low and very imperfect, in comparison with those it enjoys, when it is centred and fixed in its everlasting Rest. They differ as the shadow of the Labourer, for an hour in the day, from his Rest in his Bed when his Work is ended.
5. To conclude, The Pleasures it hath here, are but the Pleasures of Hope and Expectation, which cannot bear any proportion to those of sight and full fruition. O see the advantages of an unbodied state.