A26921:115
Richard Baxter's dying thoughts upon Phil. I, 23 written for his own life and…
Richard Baxter's dying thoughts upon Phil. I, 23 written for his own life and the latter times of his corporal pains and weakness.
London: printed by Tho. Snowden for B. Simmons, 1683
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
§ 41. 7. And I find also that man is a sociable nature and that all men find by experience that conjunction in societies, is needful to their Safety, strength and Pleasure.
§ 42. 8. And I find that my Soul would fain be nearer God, and that darkness and distance is my misery and near communion is it that would answer all the tendencies of my Soul: Why then should I fear too near a Union.
§ 43. I think it utterly improbable, that my Soul ⟨p. 26⟩should become more nearly united to any creature, than to God: (though it be of the same kind with other Souls, and infinitely below God): For God is as near me as I am to my self: I still depend on him as the effect upon its total constant cause; And that not as the fruit upon the Tree, which borroweth all from the Earth, Water, Air, and Fire which it communicateth to its fruit; but as a creature on its Creator, who hath no Being but what it receiveth totally from God, by constant communication. Hence Antonine, Seneca, and the rest of the Stoics thought that all the World was God, or one Great Animal consisting of Divine Spirit and Matter, as Man of Soul and body; Sometime calling the supposed Soul of the World, GOD, and sometime calling the whole World, God; But still meaning that the Universe was but one Spirit and Body united and that we all are parts of God, or of the Body of God, or Accidents at least.
§ 43. I think it utterly improbable, that my Soul ⟨p. 26⟩should become more nearly united to any creature, than to God: (though it be of the same kind with other Souls, and infinitely below God): For God is as near me as I am to my self: I still depend on him as the effect upon its total constant cause; And that not as the fruit upon the Tree, which borroweth all from the Earth, Water, Air, and Fire which it communicateth to its fruit; but as a creature on its Creator, who hath no Being but what it receiveth totally from God, by constant communication. Hence Autonine, Seneca, and the rest of the Stoicks thought that all the World was God, or one Great Animal consisting of Divine Spirit and Matter, as Man of Soul and body; Sometime calling the supposed Soul of the World, GOD, and sometime calling the whole World, God; But still meaning that the Universe was but one Spirit and Body united and that we all are parts of God, or of the Body of God, or Accidents at least.