of his body, so also “in the nature of his soul.”[107] We know that we
have an understanding in us; a substance we cannot see, but we know it
by its operations; as thinking, reasoning, willing, remembering, and
as operating about things that are invisible and remote from sense.
This must needs be distinct from the body; for that being but dust and
earth in its original, hath not the power of reasoning and thinking;
for then it would have that power, when the soul were absent, as well
as when it is present. Besides, if it had that power of thinking, it
could think only of those things which are sensible, and made up of
matter, as itself is. This soul hath a greater excellency; it can know
itself, rejoice in itself, which other creatures in this world are not
capable of. The soul is the greatest glory of this lower world; and,
as one saith, “There seems to be no more difference between the soul
and an angel, than between a sword in the scabbard and when it is out
of the scabbard.”[108]
1. Consider the vastness of its capacity. The understanding can
conceive the whole world, and paint in itself the invisible pictures
of all things. It is capable of apprehending and discoursing of things
superior to its own nature. “It is suited to all objects, as the
eye to all colors, or the ear to all sounds.”[109] How great is the
memory, to retain such varieties, such diversities! The will also can
accommodate other things to itself. It invents arts for the use of man:
prescribes rules for the government of states; ransacks the bowels of
nature; makes endless conclusions, and steps in reasoning from one
thing to another, for the knowledge of truth. It can contemplate and
form notions of things higher than the world.
2. The quickness of its motion. “Nothing is more quick in the whole
course of nature. The sun runs through the world in a day; this can
do it in a moment. It can, with one flight of fancy, ascend to the
battlements of heaven.”[110] The mists of the air, that hinder the
sight of the eye, cannot hinder the flights of the soul; it can pass
in a moment from one end of the world to the other, and think of
things a thousand miles distant. It can think of some mean thing in
the world; and presently, by one cast, in the twinkling of an eye,
mount up as high as heaven. As its desires are not bounded by sensual
objects, so neither are the motions of it restrained by them. It will
break forth with the greatest vigor, and conceive things infinitely
above it; though it be in the body, it acts as if it were ashamed
to be cloistered in it. This could not be the result of any {a68}
material cause. Whoever knew mere matter understand, think, will? and
what it hath not, it cannot give. That which is destitute of reason
and will, could never confer reason and will. It is not the effect
of the body; for the body is fitted with members to be subject to it.
It is in part ruled by the activity of the soul, and in part by the
counsel of the soul; it is used by the soul, and knows not how it is
used.[111] Nor could it be from the parents, since the souls of the
children often transcend those of the parents in vivacity, acuteness
and comprehensiveness. One man is stupid, and begets a son with
a capacious understanding; one is debauched and beastly in morals,
and begets a son who, from his infancy, testifies some virtuous
inclinations, which sprout forth in delightful fruit with the ripeness
of his age. Whence should this difference arise,――a fool begat the
wise man, and a debauched the virtuous man? The wisdom of the one
could not descend from the foolish soul of the other; nor the virtues
of the son, from the deformed and polluted soul of the parent.[112]
It lies not in the organs of the body: for if the folly of the parent
proceeded not from their souls, but the ill disposition of the organs
of their bodies, how comes it to pass that the bodies of the children
are better organized beyond the goodness of their immediate cause?
We must recur to some invisible hand, that makes the difference, who
bestows upon one at his pleasure richer qualities than upon another.
You can see nothing in the world endowed with some excellent quality,
but you must imagine some bountiful hand did enrich it with that dowry.
None can be so foolish as to think that a vessel ever enriched itself
with that sprightly liquor wherewith it is filled; or that anything
worse than the soul should endow it with that knowledge and activity
which sparkles in it. Nature could not produce it. That nature is
intelligent, or not; if it be not, then it produceth an effect more
excellent than itself, inasmuch as an understanding being surmounts
a being that hath no understanding. If the supreme cause of the soul
be intelligent, why do we not call it God as well as nature? We must
arise from hence to the notion of a God; a spiritual nature cannot
proceed but from a spirit higher than itself, and of a transcendent
perfection above itself. If we believe we have souls, and understand
the state of our own faculties, we must be assured that there was some
invisible hand which bestowed those faculties, and the riches of them
upon us. A man must be ignorant of himself before he can be ignorant
of the existence of God. By considering the nature of our souls, we
may as well be assured that there is a God, as that there is a sun, by
the shining of the beams in at our windows; and, indeed, the soul is
a statue and representation of God, as the landscape of a country or a
map represents all the parts of it, but in a far less proportion than
the country itself is. The soul fills the body, and God the world;
the soul sustains the body, and God the world; the soul sees, but is
not seen; God sees all things, but is himself invisible. How base are
they {a69} then that prostitute their souls, an image of God, to base
things unexpressibly below their own nature!
3. I might add, the union of soul and body. Man is a kind of compound
of angel and beast, of soul and body; if he were only a soul, he were
a kind of angel; if only a body, he were another kind of brute. Now
that a body as vile and dull as earth, and a soul that can mount up
to heaven, and rove about the world, with so quick a motion, should be
linked in so strait an acquaintance; that so noble a being as the soul
should be inhabitant in such a tabernacle of clay; must be owned to
some infinite power that hath so chained it.
Thirdly, Man witnesseth to a God in the operations and reflections of
conscience. (Rom. ii. 15), “Their thoughts are accusing or excusing.”
An inward comfort attends good actions, and an inward torment follows
bad ones; for there is in every man’s conscience fear of punishment
and hope of reward; there is, therefore, a sense of some superior
judge, which hath the power both of rewarding and punishing. If man
were his supreme rule, what need he fear punishment, since no man
would inflict any evil or torment on himself; nor can any man be
said to reward himself, for all rewards refer to another, to whom the
action is pleasing, and is a conferring some good a man had not before;
if an action be done by a subject or servant, with hopes of reward, it
cannot be imagined that he expects a reward from himself, but from the
prince or person whom he eyes in that action, and for whose sake he
doth it.
1. There is a law in the minds of men which is a rule of good and
evil. There is a notion of good and evil in the consciences of men,
which is evident by those laws which are common in all countries,
for the preserving human societies, the encouragement of virtue, and
discouragement of vice; what standard should they have for those laws
but a common reason? the design of those laws was to keep men within
the bounds of goodness for mutual commerce, whence the apostle calls
the heathen magistrate a “minister of God for good” (Rom. xiii. 4):
and “the Gentiles do by nature the things contained in the law”
(Rom. ii. 14).
Man in the first instant of the use of reason, finds natural
principles within himself; directing and choosing them, he finds a
distinction between good and evil; how could this be if there were not
some rule in him to try and distinguish good and evil? If there was
not such a law and rule in man, he could not sin; for where there is
no law there is no transgression. If man were a law to himself, and
his own will his law, there could be no such thing as evil; whatsoever
he willed, would be good and agreeable to the law, and no action could
be accounted sinful; the worst act would be as commendable as the
best. Everything at man’s appointment would be good or evil. If there
were no such law, how should men that are naturally inclined to evil
disapprove of that which is unlovely, and approve of that good which
they practise not? No man but inwardly thinks well of that which
is good, while he neglects it; and thinks ill of that which is evil,
while he commits it. Those that are vicious, do praise those that
practise the contrary virtues. Those that are evil would seem to be
good, and those that are blameworthy {a70} yet will rebuke evil in
others. This is really to distinguish between good and evil; whence
doth this arise, by what rule do we measure this, but by some innate
principle? And this is universal, the same in one man as in another,
the same in one nation as in another; they are born with every man,
and inseparable from his nature (Prov. xxvii. 19): as in water, face
answers to face, so the heart of man to man. Common reason supposeth
that there is some hand which hath fixed this distinction in man;
how could it else be universally impressed? No law can be without a
lawgiver: no sparks but must be kindled, by some other. Whence should
this law then derive its original? Not from man; he would fain blot
it out, and cannot alter it when he pleases. Natural generation never
intended it; it is settled therefore by some higher hand, which, as
it imprinted it, so it maintains it against the violence of men, who,
were it not for this law, would make the world more than it is, an
aceldama and field of blood; for had there not been some supreme good,
the measure of all other goodness in the world, we could not have
had such a thing as good. The Scripture gives us an account that this
good was distinguished from evil before man fell, they were _objecta
scibilia_; good was commanded and evil prohibited, and did not depend
upon man. From this a man may rationally be instructed that there is
a God; for he may thus argue: I find myself naturally obliged to do
this thing, and avoid that; I have, therefore, a superior that doth
oblige me; I find something within me that directs me to such actions,
contrary to my sensitive appetite; there must be something above
me, therefore, that puts this principle into man’s nature; if there
were no superior, I should be the supreme judge of good and evil;
were I the lord of that law which doth oblige me, I should find no
contradiction within myself, between reason and appetite.
2. From the transgression of this law of nature, fears do arise in
the consciences of men. Have we not known or heard of men struck by
so deep a dart, that could not be drawn out by the strength of men, or
appeased by the pleasure of the world; and men crying out with horror,
upon a death‑bed, of their past life, when “their fear hath come as a
desolation, and destruction as a whirlwind?” (Prov. i. 27): and often
in some sharp affliction, the dust hath been blown off from men’s
consciences, which for a while hath obscured the writing of the law.
If men stand in awe of punishment, there is then some superior to whom
they are accountable; if there were no God, there were no punishment
to fear. What reason of any fear, upon the dissolution of the knot
between the soul and body, if there were not a God to punish, and
the soul remained not in being to be punished? How suddenly will
conscience work upon the appearance of an affliction, rouse itself
from sleep like an armed man, and fly in a man’s face before he is
aware of it! It will “surprise the hypocrites” (Isa. xxxviii. 14):
it will bring to mind actions committed long ago, and set them in
order before the face, as God’s deputy, acting by his authority and
omniscience. As God hath not left himself without a witness among
the creatures (Acts xiv. 17), so he hath not left himself without
a witness in a man’s own breast.
(1.) This operation of conscience hath been universal. No nation {a71}
hath been any more exempt from it than from reason; not a man but hath
one time or other more or less smarted under the sting of it. All over
the world conscience hath shot its darts; it hath torn the hearts of
princes in the midst of their pleasures; it hath not flattered them
whom most men flatter; nor feared to disturb their rest, whom no man
dares to provoke. Judges have trembled on a tribunal, when innocents
have rejoiced in their condemnation. The iron bars upon Pharaoh’s
conscience, were at last broke up, and he acknowledged the justice
of God in all that he did, (Exod. ix. 27): “I have sinned, the Lord
is righteous, and I and my people are wicked.” Had they been like
childish frights at the apprehension of bugbears, why hath not reason
shaken them off? But, on the contrary, the stronger reason grows,
the smarter those lashes are; groundless fears had been short‑lived,
age and judgment would have worn them off, but they grow sharper with
the growth of persons. The Scripture informs us they have been of as
ancient a date as the revolt of the first man, (Gen. iii. 10): “I was
afraid,” saith Adam, “because I was naked;” which was an expectation
of the judgment of God. All his posterity inherit his fears, when God
expresseth himself in any tokens of his majesty and providence in the
world. Every man’s conscience testifies that he is unlike what he
ought to be, according to that law engraven upon his heart. In some,
indeed, conscience may be seared or dimmer; or suppose some men may
be devoid of conscience, shall it be denied to be a thing belonging
to the nature of man? Some men have not their eyes, yet the power of
seeing the light is natural to man, and belongs to the integrity of
the body. Who would argue that, because some men are mad, and have
lost their reason by a distemper of the brain, that therefore reason
hath no reality, but is an imaginary thing? But I think it is a
standing truth that every man hath been under the scourge of it, one
time or other, in a less or a greater degree; for, since every man is
an offender, it cannot be imagined, conscience, which is natural to
man, and an active faculty, should always lie idle, without doing this
part of its office. The apostle tells us of the thoughts accusing or
excusing one another, (or by turns), according as the actions were.
Nor is this truth weakened by the corruptions in the world, whereby
many have thought themselves bound in conscience to adhere to a false
and superstitious worship and idolatry, as much as any have thought
themselves bound to adhere to a worship commanded by God. This very
thing infers that all men have a reflecting principle in them; it is
no argument against the being of conscience, but only infers that it
may err in the application of what it naturally owns. We can no more
say, that because some men walk by a false rule, there is no such
thing as conscience, than we can say that because men have errors in
their minds, therefore they have no such faculty as an understanding;
or because men will that which is evil, they have no such faculty as a
will in them.
(2.) These operations of conscience are when the wickedness is most
secret. These tormenting fears of vengeance have been frequent in
men, who have had no reason to fear man, since their wickedness
being unknown to any but themselves, they could have no accuser
but themselves. They have been in many acts which their companions
{a72} have justified them in; persons above the stroke of human laws,
yea, such as the people have honored as gods, have been haunted by
them. Conscience hath not been frighted by the power of princes, or
bribed by the pleasures of courts. David was pursued by his horrors,
when he was, by reason of his dignity, above the punishment of the law,
or, at least, was not reached by the law; since, though the murder
of Uriah was intended by him, it was not acted by him. Such examples
are frequent in human records; when the crime hath been above any
punishment by man, they have had an accuser, judge, and executioner
in their own breasts. Can this be originally from a man’s self? He who
loves and cherishes himself, would fly from anything that disturbs him;
it is a greater power and majesty from whom man cannot hide himself,
that holds him in those fetters. What should affect their minds for
that which can never bring them shame or punishment in this world, if
there were not some supreme judge to whom they were to give an account,
whose instrument conscience is? Doth it do this of itself? hath it
received an authority from the man himself to sting him? It is some
supreme power that doth direct and commission it against our wills.
(3.) These operations of conscience cannot be totally shaken off by
man. If there be no God, why do not men silence the clamors of their
consciences, and scatter those fears that disturb their rest and
pleasures? How inquisitive are men after some remedy against those
convulsions! Sometimes they would render the charge insignificant,
and sing a rest to themselves, though they “walk in the wickedness
of their own hearts.”[113] How often do men attempt to drown it by
sensual pleasures, and perhaps overpower it for a time; but it revives,
reinforceth itself, and acts a revenge for its former stop. It holds
sin to a man’s view, and fixes his eyes upon it, whether he will or no.
“The wicked are like a troubled sea, and cannot rest,” (Isa. lvii. 20):
they would wallow in sin without control, but this inward principle
will not suffer it; nothing can shelter men from those blows. What
is the reason it could never be cried down? Man is an enemy to his
own disquiet; what man would continue upon the rack, if it were in
his power to deliver himself? Why have all human remedies been without
success, and not able to extinguish those operations, though all
the wickedness of the heart hath been ready to assist and second the
attempt? It hath pursued men notwithstanding all the violence used
against it; and renewed its scourges with more severity, as men deal
with their resisting slaves. Man can as little silence those thunders
in his soul, as he can the thunders in the heavens; he must strip
himself of his humanity, before he can be stripped of an accusing
and affrighting conscience; it sticks as close to him as his nature;
since man cannot throw out the process it makes against him, it is an
evidence that some higher power secures its throne and standing. Who
should put this scourge into the hand of conscience, which no man in
the world is able to wrest out?
(4.) We may add, the comfortable reflections of conscience. There are
excusing, as well as accusing reflections of conscience, when things
are done as works of the “law of nature,” (Rom. ii. 15): as it doth
{a73} not forbear to accuse and torture, when a wickedness, though
unknown to others, is committed; so when a man hath done well, though
he be attacked with all the calumnies the wit of man can forge, yet
his conscience justifies the action, and fills him with a singular
contentment. As there is torture in sinning, so there is peace and joy
in well‑doing. Neither of those it could do, if it did not understand
a Sovereign Judge, who punishes the rebels, and rewards the well‑doer.
Conscience is the foundation of all religion; and the two pillars
upon which it is built, are the being of God, and the bounty of God
to those that “diligently seek him.”[114] This proves the existence
of God. If there were no God, conscience were useless; the operations
of it would have no foundation, if there were not an eye to take
notice, and a hand to punish or reward the action. The accusations
of conscience evidence the omniscience and the holiness of God;
the terrors of conscience, the justice of God; the approbations of
conscience, the goodness of God. All the order in the world owes
itself, next to the providence of God, to conscience; without it the
world would be a Golgotha. As the creatures witness, there was a first
cause that produced them, so this principle in man evidenceth itself
to be set by the same hand, for the good of that which it had so
framed. There could be no conscience if there were no God, and man
could not be a rational creature, if there were no conscience. As
there is a rule in us, there must be a judge, whether our actions be
according to the rule. And since conscience in our corrupted state
is in some particular misled, there must be a power superior to
conscience, to judge how it hath behaved itself in its deputed office;
we must come to some supreme judge, who can judge conscience itself.
As a man can have no surer evidence that he is a being, than because
he thinks he is a thinking being; so there is no surer evidence
in nature that there is a God, than that every man hath a natural
principle in him, which continually cites him before God, and puts him
in mind of him, and makes him one way or other fear him, and reflects
upon him whether he will or no. A man hath less power over his
conscience, than over any other faculty; he may choose whether he will
exercise his understanding about, or move his will to such an object;
but he hath no such authority over his conscience: he cannot limit it,
or cause it to cease from acting and reflecting; and therefore, both
that, and the law about which it acts, are settled by some Supreme
Authority in the mind of man, and this is God.